Bloom Energy claims that it will be an unstoppable force in the alternative energy business and its got huge corporate support

The
future of energy is now, says Bloom Energy. At a press
conference today, it unveiled its surprisingly small fuel cell
"solutions" boxes. The so-called "Bloom Energy
Servers" – which are about as tall as an adult male – can
use virtually any hydrocarbon fuel (methane, propane, ethanol,
gasoline, liquified coal) and produce energy twice as efficiently as
a coal plant. Bloom Energy is trying to revolutionize the power
generation industry – the key is cutting out the middle-man (power
transmission) and embracing a modular design akin to servers, the
backbone of the internet.

The company's fuel cell boxes are
composed of ceramic (sand derived) discs and special ink. It
garnered
attention earlier this week when it was featured on the CBS news
program 60 Minutes. While many alternative energy
startups have struggled to find financial backers, it already has
publicized major support from some of the tech industry's biggest
names -- Google, eBay, Fedex, Staples, and Walmart.

At
the event it announced that its fuel cell generators emit 60 percent
less carbon per unit energy than a traditional coal power plant.
And unlike a coal power plant, the power is produced on site so there
are no grid losses. The whole process can be carbon neutral if
the hydrocarbon source is an organic such as algae or switchgrass
ethanol (as opposed to fossil fuels).

K. R. Sridhar, the
ex-NASA researcher who founded the company says that he initially
developed the technology to power Mars colonies, but in the end it
proved too compelling not to offer on Earth. He states, "After
spending a decade of working on this, I had to look back at our first
home. While I was dreaming about Mars and our colonies, historically
unprecedented things had happened on Earth. For me, it was
really a composite image of... a bright world and a dark world. It
was the image of the world of haves and the world of have nots. Those
who had the opportunity for economy growth and those who were denied
that."

He said the company was founded to provide the two
billion people worldwide without access to affordable power a new,
affordable energy source.

The result he obtained was a fuel
cell that went from "powder to power" and was "twice"
as efficient as traditional power plants due to the on-site scheme
eliminating grid losses. In his designs, a single fuel cell
disc produces 25 W; a "stack" composed of multiple cells
produces 1 kW; a "module" produces 25 kW; and a
corporate-ready "system" produces 100 kW. A corporate
"solution" (consisting of several Bloom Energy Servers or
"systems") supplies up to 1 MW of power.

The
power is continuous and flexible, unlike solar or wind energy.
As Mr. Sridhar describes, "This is not when the sun shines, this
is not when the wind blows... that's how this little piece of sand is
different than what's been done before.""

The real
flesh of Bloom Energy's plan, though, is its planned consumer debut
which will be carried out over the next few years. Bloom aims
at providing consumers with $3,000 units that will produce enough
power to support the average home at minimal fuel cost. It
plans to push the power generation industry towards the same model
that made the internet so fabulously successful -- server-based
scaling. In fact, it refers to its products as energy "servers"
-- entirely flexible, modular power units.

The units (of any
size) pay back their cost within 3 to 5 years and they will operate
efficiently for 10 years (at which point they would presumably be
serviced with new catalyst material, i.e. new fuel cell discs).

At
the event Bloom Energy mentioned several more big backers --
Coca-Cola, Bank of America, Cox -- that
have embraced the company's power generators [PDF]. Many of
these backers -- including John Donaho of eBay, Bill Simon of
Walmart, Brian Kelly of Coca-Cola, and Google's Larry Page – spoke
at the event expressing their wild enthusiasm for Bloom Energy's
delivery. Describes Donahoe, "It was almost too good to be
true."

With that kind of corporate support, it's hard not
to buy in to the hype. One thing that Bloom Energy did not note
was that most of the adoption thus far has been in California where
tax breaks could discount the Bloom Energy Servers by as much as 20
percent. With an additional 30 percent federal tax break for
"green" investments, the costs could be cut even further.
Still, even without tax breaks, if the company's payoff numbers and
reliability are as good as it says, the units could enjoy market
success. If that's true, that's great news for the startup and
a rarity in this business segment.

There are still some
unresolved questions, however. What exactly is the secret
"colored inks" that Bloom Energy paints its cells with and
are so great at catalyzing the production of energy from hydrocarbon
fuels? Bloom Energy still hasn't revealed the formula (perhaps
it's patent pending). Still, it today offered a lot more
details on its big corporate backing, its efficiency numbers, and its
plan for consumer rollout. It's definitely going to be a fun
ride watching this one in years to come.

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The truck/tank thing might be done for NG as well, but is very popular for propane. It may be that NG piped to the home is only common in northern areas that favour NG for heating.

I really think there should be a good opportunity for this or similar high-temperature fuel cell installations for places such as apartment buildings. Use the combined-cycle approach and take the waste heat for building heating or cooling. It's possible to get the fuel utilisation up past 80%.

I don't think it is done for NG because unlike liquid propane it would either need to be one of the following:a) extremely cold to be liquefied (expensive and loses for evaporation)b) massive tank (3 day backup @ 100 KW would be 30,000 cubic feet of NG)c) the NG would need to be highly compressed (energy intensive)

All of those have high costs and losses associated with them.

For natural gas it simply makes more sense to get it piped to you at low pressure. If the Bloom claim is correct though you can use any hydrocarbon. So a site could generate its own power via NG and have another onsite fuel (propane) which has a higher cost but is easier stored as an emergency backup. You get low cost of NG combined with onsite security of propane.

LP (Liquid Propane) is as the name implies is stored as a liquid and NG (natural gas) as a gas. My guess is that the BTU/Cubic foot makes it unreasonable to store NG at your home in a tank. In order to get the same BTU you would need a much larger/unsightly tank.

You are familiar with LP because your rural, it is not usually beneficial to run NG lines to service 1 home / square mile. But in towns it is part of the infrastructure,and is far more effective than have a truck drive around and service each home.

"A politician stumbles over himself... Then they pick it out. They edit it. He runs the clip, and then he makes a funny face, and the whole audience has a Pavlovian response." -- Joe Scarborough on John Stewart over Jim Cramer